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THE SURVEY-IDEA IN 
COUNTRY-LIFE WORK 






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Training Conference for L. H. Bailey 

Rural Leaders 
Cornell University 
July 26, 27, 1911 

The Survey-Idea in Country-Life Work 

It is commonly understood that there is a positive 
national problem lying in the present condition of 
country life. Rural affairs are not sufficientl}^ repre- 
sented in the voice of the people. The domination of 
national policies lies with the cities or with the types 
of associate and corporate interests that center 
chiefly in the cities, and which tend to exploit or at 
least to overlook the open country. 

Many processes are suggested for the general 
regeneration of rural affairs. Each of these proc- 
esses has its strong advocates. The tendency is to 
project many separate processes or methods which, 
although they may all be excellent in themselves, 
tend to separate into divergent and unrelated lines 
of effort. We are not to liold that any one way of at- 
tacking the rural problem is fundamental and that 
others are unimportant. Perhaps every method that 
has been suggested is essential. But whatever the 
means and movements, the scientific method must 
prevail. The scientific method is first to determine 
the exact facts, and then to found the line of action 



on these facts. This is the way in which all prob- 
lems must be attacked if real and permanent solu- 
tions are to be found. The scientific method in en- 
gineering and mechanics and biology and the rest has 
been responsible for the high development of civiliza- 
tion within the past century. Similar methods must 
be applied in rural work. We must finally found all 
our progress in rural life on a close study of the facts 
and the real elements in the situation, in order that 
we may know exactly what we are talking a1)out. 

A movement to collect such facts is now just be- 
ginning to appear. It is generally spoken of as ' ' ag- 
ricultural surveys." While there have been geologi- 
cal surveys, soil surveys, and studies of particular 
phases of the rural situation for many years, never- 
theless the consciousness that the entire situation 
must be studied in all its relations has only recently 
begun to take possession of the public mind. 

TJie Cornell Contribution 

In this address I am not to give an historical re- 
view of these surveys or to estimate the many contri- 
butions that have been made to the idea. I plan only 
to answer the question, so often put to me, as to what 
Cornell has done and also what is my own conception 
of the agricultural survey problem. 

At Cornell, the survey-idea began to take shape 

2 



more than twenty years ago. It was really begun 
with a piece of work in 1890 that culminated in the 
publication of Bulletin 19, "Report upon the Condi- 
tion of Fruit-growing in Western New York." On 
the passage of the Experiment Station Extension 
Bill, or "Nixon Bill," in 1894, a definite program of 
exploration of the horticultural industries of the 
State was begun, and several bulletins were the re- 
sult, such as "Imj^ressions of the Peach Industry in 
Western New York," "The Cultivation of Or- 
chards," "The Geological History of the Chautauqua 
Grape Belt," and others. 

In the first report on this "extension work in 
horticulture," for 1895, the writer made the follow- 
ing statement: "Another type of research work 
which we have undertaken under the auspices of this 
bill [the "Nixon Bill," applying to the fifth judicial 
department of the State] is the investigation of the 
conditions of certain horticultural interests in West- 
ern New York. In the interest of these particular in- 
quiries, we traveled no less than 25,000 miles in 
Western New York and have visited and examined 
many hundreds, if not thousands, of plantations. We 
have attempted in these investigations to learn the 
actual state of the industries and to suggest means 
for their improvement. They are really the begin- 
ning of a horticultural survey which can be much ex- 

3 



tended with great profit. ' ' In the second report, for 
the year 1896, it was said : ' ' The animus of the entire 
enterprise has been an attempt to inquire into the 
agricultural status, to discover the causes of the rural 
depression, and to suggest means for improving the 
farmer's position. This attempt has been specifically 
directed to a single great branch of rural industry, 
horticulture, in pursuance of the provisions of the 
law; but what is true of the horticultural communi- 
ties is essentially true of other agricultural regions, 
and, moreover, these two types of agricultural indus- 
try cannot be separated by an^^ arbitrary lines. The 
work, therefore, has practically resulted in a broad 
study of rural economics. We conceive that it is im- 
possible really to extend the Experiment Station and 
University impulse to the people in such manner that 
it shall come to them as a living and quickening force, 
without first studying the fundamental difficulties of 
the farmers' social and political environment." 

The efforts in these early days, however, were 
necessarily confined mostly to work with crops and 
with schools; l)ut the ultimate purpose — to deter- 
mine the real basis of riu'al life — was clearly in mind 
in the direction of the work. 

The work in communities gradually took on 
larger meanings. It was desired to "round uid" an 
entire subject in a region, and to get its full signifi- 



cance. The horticultural survey work finally culmi- 
nated in the excellent apple-orchard surveys of 
Wayne and Orleans Counties, by Gr. F. Warren, under 
the direction of Professor Craig (Bulletins 226 and 
229, 1905). I think it not too much to say that these 
surveys marked a departure in this kind of work, 
substituting the statistical method for previous 
means. Orchard after orchard was studied in person 
by Warren, and the financial and farm-management 
phases of the situation were reported with care ; and 
in the Wayne survej^ the horticultural condition was 
articulated as far as possible with the geological 
horizon. 

Other surveys of this general character have 
been made, and one of them has been published, 1910, 
as an "Apple Orchard Survey of Niagara County," 
under the direction of Professor Craig; and a corres- 
pondence survey, under direction of Professor War- 
ren, was published in 1909 as ''The Income of 178 
New York Farms." 

The results of the statistical work in Wayne and 
Orleans Counties were so striking that it was now 
proposed to apply the method to farming in general 
rather than to a single crop or product. In 1906, un- 
der Professor Hunt's immediate direction, a survey 
was planned of Tompkins County, the seat of the New 
York State College of Agriculture. It was found at 



the close of the first season's work that it is impossi- 
ble, in practice, to cover all or even a large part of the 
rural situation in any region by going over it once; 
and the Tompkins County work was narrowed to a 
farm-management surve,y, — that is, "to find the 
13rofits for the year on each farm, and to find what 
conditions and types of farming result in the largest 
profit or labor income; in other words, to find why 
certain farms pay better than others." The results 
of this survey, published in 1911 as Bulletin 295, im- 
der the leadership of Professor Warren, make a dis- 
tinct contribution to the country-life movement; and 
so far as we know, they represent the most complete 
census-taking of its kind that has yet been under- 
taken. The bulletin is a document of nearly 200 
pages, replete with carefully secured and well di- 
gested statistics and observations on the profits and 
losses of Tompkins Count}^ farms, with many inter- 
esting and applicable deductions. It will become a 
source-book not only for its region, but for general 
study of the problems involved in the business man- 
agement of farms. 

Personal Statements of tJie Survey-Idea 

As I am asked, on this occasion, for a personal 
opinion of the work and reasons involved in agricul- 
tural surveys, I may be allowed to quote statements 

6 



that I already have made on the subject. In ''The 
State and the Farmer," 1908, I made an appeal for 
the collecting of complete local fad, as follows : 

A thorough-going study of the exact agricultural 
status of every State should now be made, and it 
should be made by the State itself, working through 
an agricultural college. Such an inquiry made care- 
full,y and without haste by men who are thoroughly 
well prepared, and continuing over a series of years, 
would give us the data for all future work with local 
problems. We must have the geographical facts. 
We are now lacking them. We talk largely at ran- 
dom. We must discover the factors that determine 
the production of crops and animals in the localities, 
and the conditions that underlie and control the farm 
life. Consideration of these conditions involves 
study of local climate; knowledge of the kinds, classi- 
fication and distribution of the soils and the relation 
of place and altitude to production of crops and live- 
stock; determination of the best drainage practices 
on various soil types; consideration of the cultural 
experience and manurial needs as adapted to the 
types ; inquiry into the practice with all leading crops 
and products of the localities ; study of the possibili- 
ties for farm Avater-power; collation of conmiunity 
experience. Such a study of a State should be broad 
and general enough to consider the status of all the 
agricultural industries in the State, and it should also 
take full cognizance of educational and social condi- 
tions. 

This constitutes the greatest need of practical 
farming at the present day. The agricultural insti- 
tutions are working out the principles, but they may 
not be able to apply these principles to individual 
farms because they do not know the exact local con- 
ditions. The farmer himself may not know the prin- 
ciples, nor even the local facts. The result is a lack of 
articulation between the teaching and the practice. 



Farming is foimded on the facts of the locality: no 
business can hope for the best success until it has ex- 
act knowledge of its underlying conditions. 

These kinds of inquiries are now well under way 
in the form of "surveys" of many kinds, proceeding 
from the colleges of agriculture and the United 
States Department of Agriculture. The studies of 
larger range, that purpose to compare general agri- 
cultural conditions in the whole national domain and 
to standardize our knowledge of them, may well be 
undertaken directly by the national government; 
but the commonwealth itself should give itself the 
advantage of making inquiries into its own agricul- 
tural conditions. The survey work of the institu- 
tions will be greatly perfected in the next few years, 
and we may expect to see great public funds devoted 
to it. The survey parties will comprise strong, all- 
round men. No small part of the value of such sur- 
veys will be the discovery of great numbers of earn- 
est, competent men and women on the farms who 
may be made local leaders, and the recognition tliat 
it will give to good agricultural practice everywhere. 
Every thorough survey should l)e the forerunner of 
new ideals for the communities, and of new points of 
crystallization of local effort. It should make new 
paths. 

I later made another brief statement as follows 

in "The Country-Life Movement," 1911: 

The taking stock of the exact condition and ma- 
terials of country life is immensely important, for we 
cannot apply remedies before we make a diagnosis, 
and an accurate diagnosis must rest on a multitude 
of facts that we do not now possess. This is the sci- 
entific rather than the doctrinaire, politics, and orac- 
ular method of approaching the subject. It is of the 
first importance that we do not set out on this new 
work with only general opinions and superficial and 
fragmentary knowledge. Every rural community 



r 



needs to have a program of its own carefully worked 
out, and this program should rest on a physical valu- 
ation. It may be some time yet before the importance 
and magnitude of this undertaking will impress the 
minds of the people, but it is essential to the best per- 
manent progress. 

Statement of the Commission on Country Life 

The Commission on Country Life, 1909, after 
having considered great numbers of suggestions from 
persons in all parts of the country, mentioned as 
the first item in its category of the most prominent 
deficiencies in country life in the United States, "a 
lack of knowledge on the part of farmers of the exact 
agricultural conditions and possibilities of their re- 
gions." It also stated that this lack of knowledge 
constitutes one of the great "underlying problems of 
country life." Its main statement in regard to the 
need of agricultural or country life surveys is as fol- 
lows: 

The time has now come when we should know in 
detail what our agricultural resources are. We have 
long been engaged in making geological surveys, 
largely with a view to locating our mineral wealth. 
The country has been explored and mapped. The 
main native resources have been located in a general 
way. We must now know what are the capabilities 
of every agricultural locality, for agriculture is the 
basis of our prosperity and farming is always a local 
business. We cannot 'make the best and most perma- 
nent progress in the developing a good country life 
until we have completed a very careful inventory of 
the entire country. 



This inventory or census sliould take into ac- 
count the detailed topography and soil conditions of 
the localities, the local climate, the whole character of 
streams and forests, the agricultural products, the 
cropping systems now in practice, the conditions of 
highways, markets, facilities in the way of transpor- 
tation and communication, the institutions and or- 
ganizations, the adaptability of the neighborhood to 
the establishment of handicrafts and local industries, 
the general economic and social status of the people 
and the character of the people themselves, natural 
attractions and disadvantages, historical data, and a 
collation of community experience. This would re- 
sult in the collection of local fact, on wdiich we could 
proceed to build a scientifically and economically 
sound country life. 

Beginnings have been made in several states in 
the collection of these geographical facts, mostly in 
connection with the land-grant colleges. The United 
States Department of Agriculture is beginning by 
means of soil surveys, study of farm management and 
other investigations; and its demonstration work in 
the Southern states is in part of this character. These 
agencies are beginning the study of conditions in the 
Localities themselves. It is a kind of extension work. 
All these agencies are doing good work; but we have 
not ,yet as a peo^ole come to an appreciation of the 
fact that we must take account of stock in detail as 
well as in the large. We are working mostly around 
the edges of the problem, and feeling of it. The larger 
part of the responsibility of this work must lie with 
the different states, for they should develop their in- 
ternal resources. The whole work should be coordi- 
nated, however, by federal agencies acting with the 
states, and some of the larger relations will need to 
be studied directly by the federal government itself. 
We must come to a thoroughly nationalized move- 
ment to imderstand what property we have and what 



10 



uses may best be made of it. This in time will call for 
large appropriations by state and nation. 

To secure these results, the Commission's first 
recommendation is that "there should now be organ- 
ized, under government leadership, a comprehensive 
plan for an exhaustive study or survey of all the con- 
ditions that surround the business of farming and the 
people who live in the country, in order to take stock 
of our resources and to supply the farmer with local 
knowledge. Federal and state governments, agri- 
cultural colleges and other educational agencies, or- 
ganizations of various types, and individual students 
of the problem should be brought into cooperation 
for this great work of investigating with minute care 
all agricultural and country life conditions." 

The Scope and Character of Survey-work 
Surveys may be of many kinds and for many 
purposes. Some of them may be for temporary uses 
only, in the nature of explorations or to set forth a 
particular line of ideas. The real rural survey should 
be an agency of record; and it is this type of effort 
that I am now discussing. 

We must distinguish sharply between such a 
survey, made slowly and studiously, and an inspec- 
tion, a canvass, or a campaign. These lighter efforts 
may be very necessary, but they usually do not con- 

11 



stitute investigation, and they belong to a different 
order of inquiry. 

If a survey of any region or phase is to be a 
record of fact, then it must be strictly scientific in 
spirit^ as I already have indicated. It must discover 
and set down every fact of significance, wholly apart 
from any prejudice or bias in the mind of the ob- 
server: the fact is its own justification. The work 
cannot be as precise as that in the mathematical and 
physical sciences; but in its purpose it must be as 
scientific as any work in any subject. 

If the work is scientific, then it will not ])e under- 
taken for the purpose of exploiting a movement, 
recruiting an organization, spreading a propaganda, 
advertising a region, or promoting the personal am- 
bition of any man. There is indication that sur- 
vey-work will soon become popular; there is danger 
that it will l)e taken up l)y institutions that desire to 
keep themselves before the public and l)y localities 
and states that desire to display their advantages. It 
wdll be easy to marshal statements and arrange 
figures, and particularly to omit facts, in such a way 
as to make a most attractive showing. Even some 
honest investigators will be likely to arrange the ma- 
terial in such a way as to prove a point rather than to 
state the facts, unless they are very much on their 

12 



guard. If country-life surveys have possibilities of 
great good, they also have equal possibilities of great 
damage. 

The goal of survey-work in agriculture is to 
make a record of the e7itire situation and to tell the 
whole truth. Fragmentary surveys and piece-work, 
however good they may be in themselves, do not rep- 
resent the best effort in surveys. Practically all our 
surveys have thus far been fragmentary or unrelated, 
but this is the work of a beginning epoch. We shall 
almost necessarily be obliged to do still further frac- 
tional and detached work; but it is time that we begin 
to train the imagination on completer and sounder 
programs. The whole basis and condition of the 
rural communit}^ must be known and recorded. The 
community must know where it stands. It must 
understand its assets and its liabilities. 

Survey-work is legitimate wholly aside from its 
application. I have no patience with the doctrine of 
''pure science," — that science is science only as it is 
uncontaminated by application in the arts of life ; and 
I also have no patience with the spirit that considers 
a piece of work to be legitimate only as it has direct 
bearing on the arts and affairs of men. We must dis- 
cover all things that are discoverable and attack 
those that are not discoverable and make record of it 

13 



all: the application will take care of itself. The ap- 
plication of science lies not alone in its employment 
in particularities here and there, but quite as much 
in the type of mind and the philosophy of life that 
result from it. If we knew our exact rural status — 
in materials, accomplishments and deficiencies, — we 
should by that very fact have a different outlook on 
the rural problem and a surer process of attacking it. 
We should do little guessing. We should correct 
manv vagaries and manv a foolish notion to which 
we now are all, no doubt, very much given. We 
should not be obliged to follow blind or self-wise 
leaders. A substantial body of accumulated fact 
would set bounds to the agitator. 

The result of survey-work in agriculture should 
be to tie the community together. Such work would 
jDrovide a basis for real judgment on the part of every 
intelligent resident of the neighborhood. One inter- 
est w^ould be tied up with another. Apple-growing 
would not be distinct from wheat-growing, or church 
work from school work, or soil-types from the cream- 
ery business, or politics from home life. The vicinage 
would be presented to the citizen as a whole. Noth- 
ing, in my opinion, would do so much to develop 
pride of neighborhood, local patriotism, and com- 
munity common sense as a full and complete knowl- 

14 



edge of what the commimity is in its resources, its 
history, its folk, its industries, its institutions, and 
its tendencies. 

I am often told that we can gather all the infor- 
mation that is useful hy surveying representative 
communities here and there rather than by surveying 
all communities, — that if we take stock of all com- 
munities we shall be endlessly duplicating. But I 
think that I have now said enough to put it into the 
mind of my hearer that the community needs a sur- 
vey/or itself. We are to build the life of every com- 
munity on the fact of that community. It may not be 
necessary to make the same studies or even equally 
extensive studies in all communities; but no com- 
munity should be overlooked, in the end, if we desire 
a correlated evolution of rural society. 

When the surve3-idea is once understood and 
begun, every locality will desire to be represented. 
Certain regions will develop full surveys, and the re- 
ports will be standard; the surveys of intermediate 
localities may not need to be so elaborate or minute. 

When we finally understand our problem, we 
shall make our best surveys in consecutive order. 
We may classify all phases of survey-w^ork freely un- 
der three groups, — physical, economic, social; and 

15 



the order of the surveys should preferably follow this 
sequence. We should first know what the region is, 
— geography, physiography, climate, resources, soils ; 
then what it does, — the farming, the industries, the 
markets, the business, the profits-and-loss ; then how 
it lives, — its people, its homes, its health, its institu- 
tions, its modes of expression, its outlook. 

I very much doubt the lasting value of surveys 
of church or school or particular crops or special 
products that are not founded on a good knowledge 
of the physical and economic conditions of the region. 

Hoiv are zve to go about it ? 

I presume that we have no models for these 
country-life surveys. My own philosophy of the situ- 
ation has not been derived from the current social 
surveys of cities, and I do not know whether their 
methods will apply to the rural work. 

These new surveys must be serious studies on the 
spot rather than note-takings or correspondence. 
The different parts of the survey in any region must 
be made b}^ different persons or parties, in a cumula- 
tive way. Of course, as I have said, I should not 
estop any competent person or agency from making 
a partial and wholly independent study, but its de- 
ficiencies should be recognized. 

16 



As to detailed methods of making surveys, little 
need be said in an address of this kind. The success 
of the work will turn on the personality and training 
of the man who undertakes it. It must be done in 
person: that is, the information must be secured by 
personal visits and investigation. The questions 
should be few and significant. The particular survey 
should cover a definite subject, and every effort 
should be made to keep it from scattering. The ten- 
dency is to cover too much ground. It requires time, 
patience and the studious temper to make a good 
survey. At least one experienced person should be 
actually in the field: it should not be left to novices 
and mere explorers. The person should be a real 
student of the subject that he proposes to survey. 

To ensure the best results, the region should have 
good topographical and geological maps. The next 
step is a soil survey. The soil surveys now issue from 
the federal government (United States Department 
of Agriculture; and in New York they are prop- 
erly cooperative with the State College of Agricul- 
ture. The general soil survey is rightly a national 
undertaking, for there should be a uniform charting 
of the national domain as to soil types as w^ell as to 
geological types; and classifications do not follow 
state lines. The states, however, may w^ell follow 
with more detailed soil surveys, based on the gen- 

17 



eral charts, and relate the work directly to local 
practice. Undoubtedly we need to develop more uni- 
form and comparable methods for this work ; and this 
could be brought about by conferences or committees 
of those persons specially interested in the soil sur- 
vey program. 

A study of the local climate ought to be a part of 
these preliminary surveys. We are neglecting the 
climate factor. Climate is distinctly local. With soil, 
it determines the farming condition. The best agri- 
culture is a careful adjustment to the climate of the 
district; but the collecting of meteorological data is 
so much a governmental function that we forget the 
detail climates of small localities. 

It is not so clear what the next step should be in 
the stock-taking of a region. Sooner or later, all the 
natural resources of the area should be carefully 
known. Perhaps these resources of minerals and 
metals and timljer and streams and the like, will be 
clearly determined in the geological and soil and farm 
surveys themselves; but they should all be found and 
recorded. There should also be a natural-history siTr- 
vey of the entire wild life of the region, culminating 
in the publication of good local floras and faunas ; but 
perhaps this ma}^ wait for later development. It is 
probable that a thorough farm-management survey 
would best follow immediately on the soil survey, 

18 



taking inventory of the farm values, the methods of 
farming, the crop schemes, the incomes, the invest- 
ments, the labor cost, the profit-and-loss. We should 
know how the conditions and materials of the farms 
are utilized. 

A farm-management survey considers farms as 
business units. This would probably best be fol- 
lowed by a careful study of the general business situ- 
ation in the region, as respects markets, railroads, 
taxation, credit, land-tenure, labor-market, and the 
like. This is the field of rural economics, considering 
the farmer not in reference to the production of 
crops on his own farm, but in his business relations to 
his community and surroundings. 

These foundation registers having been made, 
the various crops or products of the region may be 
chosen for detailed study, as the fruit crops, truck 
crops, flower crops, home gardens, wood-lots, pas- 
tures, grain crops, new crops, milk and butter 
production, poultry, sheep, cattle, swine, horses, and 
the like. All such supplementary studies should take 
full account of every preceding study and endeavor 
to determine how far the particular industry is col- 
ored or shaped by the underlying physical and eco- 
nomic conditions. Every survey should articulate as 
far as possible with every collateral survey. 

On this basis many special and interesting 

19 



studies may be projected from year to 3^ear, — studies 
of the iudustries, the homes and domestic welfare, 
the sanitation, education, business cooperation, the 
possiljilities of engineering development, the re- 
ligious reactions, re-creation, child-study, special 
vital statistics, ethnological and historical studies, 
public relations, and the general social welfare. 

These surveys Avill be made hy many agencies. 
The strictly agricultural parts will naturally be ac- 
complished hj colleges and schools and departments 
of agriculture and by experiment stations. Societies, 
churches, individuals, and all agencies representing 
welfare will contriljute and cooperate. 

Ever,y State must soon face the problem of pro- 
jecting a regular program of stock-taking of its agri- 
cultural resources. If the work is effective, it must 
be wholly free of political methods. 

/^orecas/ 

I have now sketched a rough outline of my hope 
in the country-life survey. Looked at from the start, 
it may seem to be an ambitious program; but it will 
come only year b.y year and piece hy piece, and no- 
bod}^ will ])e startled in the process. It will be for- 
tunate if we have a clear conception at the outset of 
the results that are to be desired, and if our work pro- 
ceeds in an orderly way. We must conceive a prog- 

20 



ressing enterprise. What we are aiming at is the rec- 
ord of community experience, as a guide to further 
action. The parts of the work eventually will aggre- 
gate themselves into a Book of the Community, 
which will represent all that the community has done 
and what it hopes to do. 



21 



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